Let's Start In A Tavern! | Running the Game
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- Опубликовано: 27 сен 2024
- Episode 46. It's a perfectly cromulent place to start.
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Favorite story start:
You are in a tavern... it is on fire.
Plot twist: you are in the tavern, and YOU set it on fire.
You are a tavern and you set fire to the player.
so samurai champloo
*sipping coffee*
“Everything is fine”
Had that start once...Well, kind of.
We were in the tavern and, surprise, a fight broke out. The place was set on fire. One of the players failed several important roles getting out. Eventually, the PC left via the collapsing floor, not of his own free will, and into a stream beneath the tavern. Many failed roles and an occasional successful role later and the PC crawled out of a raging river several miles down river... nearing the mouth of the river and the ocean... several yards from a black dragon.
This was my first time experiencing “failing forward” in DND. And it was epic.
I remember talking to my wife about the “starting in a Tavern” cliché. And she was a bit grumpy about this because she “has never started in a tavern” in any campaign, and wanted so bad to start there at least once. Precisely because of this "never start in a tavern" advice. So I promised her the next time we started one game I GM'ed, it would be in a tavern, definitely.
It's a classic for a reason! :D
Thats so sweet
@@mcolville
Hey Matthew great channel bro!
So when can we start a game? Because all I come across is D&D snobs that won't let anyone in their games. And I agree with you with the long drawn out backstories unnecessary dialogues of characters.. Definitely was not the goal back in 1974! 👍
@@tonymaurice4157 start your own game if you can't find anyone to run. That's what I did.
@Sol System Well let's join forces and start a game together!
How's your game going?
Let me guess you don't take on any new players..
Hearing Colville say "I believe in you" makes me feel like I can run shadowrun.
How'd it go!?
We need an update
Did you run shadowrun?
I think it killed them!
Shadowrun has taken him.
google says "Just for the record: in some Shakespearian texts, the masculine version of a wench is a swain."
I was gonna suggest "wonch."
Michael Reese idk I kinda like weeny.... Ok that came out wrong...
Matthew Clements XD
I literally said "wonch" out loud watching this video
SERVING WEENIE! BRING ME ALE
My brother, who is into D&D in a *severe* way (I myself play and DM too, though), once designed this campaign setting after he had heard someone somewhere challenge someone else to have a campaign set wholly within a tavern. It's basically a big, Spirited Away-style bathhouse, founded by this epic-level cleric of some goddess of civilisation, meant to act as a sort of neutral ground for all kinds of people and creatures, where they could meet and essentially hang out, negotiate and generally wheel and deal in luxury. Could be just two nobles clearing up the issue of some land ownership, could be a group of ambassadors from two different empires negotiating a marriage contract. Could also be two emissaries from the plane of Earth and the plane of Air working on a peace treaty.
The party would be essentially employees of that cleric, working on the premises, and their adventures would all be about stuff like negotiating with the goblin tribe of coal shovelers who went on strike because there's something in their burrows, stealing their young. Or maybe evicting a party of adventures who made a mess of their rooms and refuse to pay for damages. Or maybe one day a freaking pit lord showing up, demanding to be served, while the celestial emissary and his posse just arrived.
Lukas Albrecht Stealing...
I hope you don't mind people stealing this. I know which campaign or one-shot I'm running next.
This is awesome!
I mean no disrespect in asking, but does your brother use the theme from 'Cheers' as mood music for this campaign?
Don't know for sure - we currently live in different countries - but now that you say it, he definitely should...
One of the WotC people said they once had a campaign that started with everyone in a tavern, when suddenly a cow flew in through a high window and crashed to the ground.
That's an opener, right there.
Here's one interesting way I'd suggest "starting in a tavern": the players wake up with a headache in the middle of a tavern, and all other patrons are dead. BAM. Immediate intrigue plot plus your players have a reason to work together.
Main bad guy's a Mind Flayer? All the other patrons are dead but seem to be *physically* unharmed. Maybe one's missing his brain.
Medusa? Nothing but stone rubble in a mostly wooden tavern save for a couple stone hands or legs on the floor
Vampires? All are drained of blood. The players feel weak but were left for dead with marks on their necks.
Demons? Pentagrams. Corpses and pentagrams.
The players are special. They survived because they're tougher or stronger or the like than the civilians that just died.
Necromancer? Its empty but blood is everywhere
I am totally using this for my next campaign
Using this. Starting a campaign tomorrow haha and don’t have a way for them to know each other. This works. I can build the world around this.
or...The Hangover in Dnd...
I think the main antagonist is alcohol.
My first D&D game: Started in a tavern. There was a drunkard that wanted to start a fight with our Wood Elf Warlock. My Dragonborn Death Cleric (hooded) broke it up before it could turn into a brawl. Even got 10gp from the tavern owner for saving his place from getting wrecked. Nice start to a campaign.
10/10, would start in a tavern again.
My first game started at a tavern when we returned with a bounty but the tavern owner couldn't pay up. He decided to trick us and throw us into a cave under the place. We fought giant spiders and used some webs to climb up through a hole in the floor in the tavern with some spider webs from a large spider we found. The bards lost his leg and decided to run the tavern after we killed the previous owner. The player decided to play a fighter because the bard sucked
My first time DMing, however, I had subbed in for the regular DM. They were walking through a market and were kidnapped by some bandits. They were brought to an run down castle in a cell. They found a key with a note that said find on the northern side of the castle walls. After sneaking around some guards, they learned that every one was under control from a racsosha and there is an army of wood woads that were summoned by the last leader to protect that castle. The guy that gave them the key had been saved by the wood woads. They used the wood woads to siege the castle, kill the racsosha, and free the people from their curse.
Only way I would change that is have the tavern keep give you 5 silver instead.
"It's a perfectly cromulent place to start."
Love the use of a Simpson's word in there.
God bless the beard, God bless the hair, God bless Matthew Colville
Our lord and savior has spoken! Quickly children! Let us praise his might and wisdom for he is our savior!
Our thoughts light the Darkness that others may cross space.
We are one with Matt Colville, our souls are joined in his will.
Praise the Matt Colville whose sacrifice is life as ours is death.
Hail his name the Master of D&D.
He posted on reddit r/mattcolville specifically stating that we should not talk about his beard, his appearance, or anyone's appearance, and blacks and females are over oppressed. He stated he will block anyone who talks about his beard.... Just a heads up and fair warning.
Chill, we're not judging or trying to offend him. We merely started a joke from the "God bless Matt Colville" part not the beard or the hair. We love the guy.
Goldy I love his videos and advice. I was just sharing what he said on Reddit.
A Golem that deals cards is awesome to have in a tavern. I've no idea where I picked that up though.
willy from the unsleeping city?
I'm nearly 50 years old and have been gaming for about 40 years. I find myself rewatching a lot of your older videos like this one for inspiration. Love the content Matt.
Excellent ideas!
An additional interesting thing I discovered when I started my first campaign a couple years ago, in a tavern of course, was that my group (almost entirely new players) had a vague familiarity with the trope of starting in a tavern. So when I said, "You are all seated in this tavern [that I'd just described]," they all became thrilled and delighted that they were getting the full traditional D&D experience of starting in the most classic way. Based on that reaction alone, I was glad I hadn't chosen one of the other openings I had considered. So there's something to be said for following tradition precisely *because* it's traditional.
Earlier this year I started a Pathfinder campaign with a couple of my friends. Their first adventure was to investigate a beast that had been terrorizing some local farms. Instead of them starting in the town directly I decided to make it so the characters had already been hired by the mayor and had already tracked the creature in fiction to this menacing cave in the woods near town. I had the players introduce their characters by describing what they looked like as if they were in a video game cut scene since they all had a lot of experience with video games. They described themselves walking into this clearing and seeing the cave and it gave us all a good sense of who they were. As soon as the "cut scene" was over, the players saw some goblin guards poke their heads out of the cave and look around, which prompted some Stealth checks and immediate planning, giving them an easy in to start rolling dice. I think it worked out pretty well for being my first real attempt at DMing in about a decade and the players seemed to really take to the idea of the cinematic. I saved the actual "You find yourselves in the tavern..." scene for the second adventure, once the players were more comfortable with each other and knew more about their characters to make that RP a bit less daunting.
Realistically it makes sense for PCs to meet strangers who can then give them quests, and a tavern is a sensable place to do this
There's quite a few ways to start a campaign.
You can start in mid-action - the characters have already accepted a quest together and are about to start an important part of it when the players essentially take over. Maybe they're just outside the door of the abandoned mine that's been taken over by goblins, maybe they're escorting a caravan when they get ambushed. Whatever it is, you can pretty much roll initiative within the first 10 minutes.
The slower start is where the characters are just *about* to get a quest. This is where starting in a tavern tends to come in - it's an opportunity for the players to introduce themselves, get into their character roles, and explore the world in a very small scale before the blacksmith comes bursting into the door because his daughter's gone missing (or whichever other plot-hook you have in mind).
Whatever your start is, though, as a DM it's usually on you to prod the characters into action. In a hot start this is easier - the players already have a quest, tell them the quest and go. In a slow-start, you have to be a little more proactive as a DM, doing something to engage the players - otherwise it is just going to be them sitting around and not really being sure what to do with themselves.
Something I personally like to do is point out someone or something in the party that's being avoided. For example, in a town that's at an uneasy cease-fire with the fey of the nearby forest, there is usually an elf, gnome or outright fairy character who's being given the stink-eye.
A tavern-alike I am a fan of is a mess hall in a prison. Combines the tavern opening with the prison break opening, it's great stuff.
In the first Tholl campaign, the players eventually introduced themselves to the walled town of Willowdale by way of the Black Eagle Inn. Within, they came to terms with the Cargynnian Empire's viewpoint on the regulation of magic, the treatment of unregistered Sorcerers, and the Black Road Smuggler's Guild (whose head is the "kindly" matron of the Inn, Moms Ulfa). In one brief session within these walls, they came to understand the Empire's tight fist on magic, religion, law enforcement, and how Human-centric this political region truly was. They learned that Adventurers required a writ to carry arms (like a Letter of Marque), otherwise they would be treated as brigands by the Empire's patrols. All of this information was through Mom's Ulfa, who took pity on the hooded Teifling Sorcerer, as Moms had a son who was "touched" by Wild Magic too, and used her connections to get him the forged papers he needed to pass as a registered Wizard of the Empire.
The (Hill) Dwarf Cleric (of Thor, because he asked) saw other Dwarves in the dining hall, and gathered information on how his people were viewed and treated.
The Half-Ogre in the group (a race I brought into 5E for my campaign, see the reference on the Nerdarchy RUclips channel. Under "Goliath", I believe) was the only to think ahead and have a Letter of Adventure, and was treated with suspicion for his size and appearance, but was not interfered with by the constabulary (without cause).
Taverns can work, but it's not the building that makes them work. It's the people and the clues planted within that do.
My players returned to the Black Eagle over and over to set up plans, meet contacts, and further their connection to Moms Ulfa and her organization.
Mike Gould Is this campaign fully homebrewed? I gotta say, if it is then you've done a really good job with the world. It seems very intriguing and immersive.
One should not aim to avoid clichés. One should aim to use clichés in interesting and fitting ways.
The only real bad way to use a cliché is to just shove it in there because it is easy to do, and everyone else is doing it.
My previous 'starting in a tavern' campaign began somewhat like this:
You wedge the last of the tables up against the tavern door as the first of the zombies smashes its way through the window. It tumbles onto the ale-soaked floor before you, bloody viscera melding into a rancid cocktail of booze of blood. Its head lurches back off the floor, and those sunken misty eyes stare an empty hatred towards you. Behind it, several more zombies clammer their way through the opening, lurching forward and sliding limply like eels over the serrated window sill. A wet guttural growl escapes its gaping mouth as the first of the zombies starts clawing its way towards you.
Roll initiative.
The way I started my first campaign is they where refugees coming from the flooded north on carriage ride. After a while on the road they gets attacked by bandits, causing the players to want revenge and highlighting the problem of the area
I made sure they had valuables and family relics, I even let one of them have a magical weapon at level 1
So that when the items would get stolen they would want them back.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, Wenches and Wienies!" I like it, I like it a lot
With my players, I started our campaign as prisoners condemned to fight until death in the arena. They were allowed to get a handle on things before they arrived, getting transported over night and getting to know each other. Then they arrived, and had to fight a few animals and then a couple of orcs until things went south. A disaster allowed them to escape and become their own new group on the run. From there many things could happen, I had them run into couriers travelling west to ask for aid in fixing the disaster. They ended up killing the couriers, basically a way of getting the cursed red gold that you featured in a video.
You can start in a tavern and throw them into the middle of the action. A fight breaks out and the PC’s end up working together to survive
Hey Matt, a great example of what you're talking about would be the inn at white orchard in the Witcher 3. I don't know if you've played it but essentially what happens is this. The inn was part of a kingdom that was defeated and the innkeeper keeps a standard of the old kingdom up. She's told to take it down and there's some strife about giving up on their old kingdom despite how there is no way they could ever make a come back. Later on before you leave the zone an event happens where the sister of a soldier who died in that war calls out the innkeeper for removing the symbol and attacks the innkeeper brutally. Your character and his mentor intervene and a fight breaks out due to the deep feelings of distrust and fear surrounding witchers. People get killed for attacking you and you're left with the innkeeper you saved screaming Get out and don't come back. It's a very interesting and complex encounter but it perfectly encapsulates the feelings of the world.
Best Way to Start a Campaign:Naked,drunk,bleeding,on the bathroom floor,with a pounding headache,a cold and the building is on fire. :B
More seriously I really like starting in a city after a disaster,in a battlefield during or after a battle,on a ship as it pulls into port or overlooking a major event (a parade,battle,speech,airship crash,ritual,etc).
I intentionally started my first campaign in a tavern just for the tradition of it. When I knew I wanted to learn how to and start DMing it was the only thing I for sure knew I wanted. Now they didn't stay in the tavern very long, but I got to say the line "We start in a tavern" so I was happy and the game was starting so the players were happy.
I LOVE taverns!!! It's the warmest and most welcoming place in any D&D world. My current character is just a lazy wanderer with magical powers (yeah, he's a sorcerer) and he has to sleep in cheap taverns if he doesn't want to spend the night on the street. My DM introduced my character in a tavern at night far from the others characters's players, so that he could sleep and dream "a prophetic dream", or something like that, that had to do with the plot, and it was the BEST introduction of my life as a player of D&D.
I had my players start in a tavern. I gave each one a little scene with NPC's, but they did not interact with each other. Then, a gang of bad guys barge in and start attacking. My players stand up and defend the bar. And this is how they all meet. One of the patrons of the bar admired how these characters reacted, and he hires them to perform a task. Thus, the players embark on their first mission together!
"You find yourself in the towns local tavern, The Hickery Dickery, guzzling down a strong elvish ale out of a tin mug. The bar keep looks at you, 'time for me to close up, and time for you to close your tab.' Suddenly, you realize you left all of your gold at home."
Duck yes, just cooked dinner, sat down, and there's a colville notification waiting for me.
It never fails to be entertaining to hear Matt vocalize his thought process during his monologues, like when he was trying to think of a male version of "wench". :)
I think if it's your first time playing, then starting in a tavern/inn is a good idea. It shows that the game isn't solely about combat and gives players a chance to naturally gear towards roleplaying.
If it's not anyone's first time playing, you should probably try to come up with a more interesting start besides "talk amongst yourselves." There are other locations where players could meet up, even as strangers, to meet and greet. A market. A ballroom as guests/guards of some noble. A jail cell / court. A gallows. A ship. A caravan. A wizard's study (waiting for the wizard to show up). Or on the trail gathered around a campfire. And many others.
A creative DM can make the tavern start interesting, but it really does need to be done sparingly because it gets old fast.
I love this, but...
I'm starting in the future of my setting. An old half orc sitting in front of the fire, eating soft meat, a blanket around his shoulders. He looks at the little ones surrounding him and says, "Let me tell you a story about the heroes I fought along side. The ones that did what they could to make this retched place better for you." Then I flash to the beginning, the tavern that brought the adventurers together.
Gotta have a tavern...
New camera setup Matt? Lovely depth of field.
James Douglass that's why it looks so different. I was worried I was going crazy.
So nice camera!
IIRC, Matt said on the short lived live stream last weekend that he's playing around with settings on the camera to explore its capabilities.
I think the focus should be just the opposite
The audio is a bit off but the video is great
I have two experiences I'd like to share with the group:
-In one campaign I was in, the DM had the players - who were mostly playing D&D for the first time - sit down and play blackjack with each other in character. He had little fake silver coins and everything. The DM played the part of the dealer, who also turned out to be the "mysterious stranger" with the quest that would change their lives and set them on the path of adventure. It was a great way for new players to start feeling out their characters in a context that was more familiar - that of a real-world card game they'd all played before.
-In another, it began where none of the players knew each other, but they were all staying at the same inn. While they were on their way back from various errands, the inn erupted in a massive fireball. While investigating the wreckage they met one of two men targeted by this assassination - the other was a heap of ashes. They recovered the item meant to be exchanged at this inn and set off to help the living man with his quest. A great way to subvert expectations right away.
Those both sound really cool. I especially love the second one. There's something very affecting about a building blowing up just as you're coming back, or rescuing a survivor from a disaster and becoming part of their story.
@@NoriMori1992 Thanks. I thought they were pretty good ideas.
My intention for a sandbox campaign that I really really honestly I promise I am going to run is to start in a tavern. A week ago you landed in this strange land seeking your fortune, a band of adventures full of piss and vinegar! In the past week you have each racked up 1d100 silver in outstanding bar debt, and the innkeep is going to hand you over to the guard if you don't settle that debt by tomorrow. Good luck!
I started my first campaign in a campsite on the road. The party had all pre-emptively met late at night while traveling at a crossroads, with the addition of three npcs - some caravaneers carting rich silks and a messenger boy. They'd all agreed to camp together, safety in numbers and all that. They get to know the nps for a moment before going to bed, finding the boys name to be Willow, and the caravaneers to be delivering fine silks to the Empress herself.
However during the night they were set upon by a zombie wandering out of the bushes, the party fought the zombie - which was a pretty straight forward kill and more of an intro to combat for new players. However, as the zombie falls, more start to wander out of the bushes, a veratible horde coming at them, they are far out-numbered, and they see this! The npcs are cowering at the center of the party who are ready to fight to the death...
But wait... they have to succeed on an out-of-nowhere spell shot from beyond the horde, a sleep spell cast at high level, five of them immediately fail, however one succeeds, just barely, and watch as their new found companions fall where they stand and a figure comes out of the treeline pointing a finger at them, the last one standing hears the word "Sleep." before they too, drift off, failing their second saving throw.
Cut to several hours later. The party wake up feeling somewhat refreshed, and they're piled on top of one another in a cell, in a basement of some kind, their weapons nowhere to be found. And a voice rings out from out of nowhere to them, "Climb to the tallest tree and you'll find the key to leave this place...Good luck adventurers!"
And the cell door swings open.
I started my campaign by having a big festival in the capital of that continent to celebrate the 10000 year anniversary of the Tarrasque being sealed away according to an old legend. However, the festival was cut short by an earthquake. A daring rescue of a mother and her child from a crumbling building later, the group encountered a townsguard who was busy calming an old man who kept shouting "The Tarrasque is coming back!". The guard asks the party to bring the old man back home for him, since the guards are busy dealing with the aftermath of the earthquake.
Every RPG tavern/cantina I've ran has a drunk Viking, Orc or Klingon somewhere ready to start a fight.
When Matt says the let's keep this video short, you know it's gonna be good.
I usually start with an ambush. Most campaigns I run start with a low fantasy quest that limits the player's ability to travel. In my current campaign there was an organized bandit "army" attacking anyone who went by road in the region and any encounter would be devastating (They were ambushed in the first session and one player got killed and another dropped to 0 HP). Basically they had to level up doing quests that destroyed the bandit's fighting ability (Destroying convoys, warehouses, etc.) until they could kill the leaders, dissolving the bandit threat.
Starting with an ambush is great as it unites the party and gives a view on the world they're in.
Fun fact: one of the words used for the male version of a wench is "swain."
Bump! This is a great piece of info
Ok totally unrelated to the video and a bit long but it was still inspired by the vid and kinda fun to ask:
What do you think about asking player to fill in details of the world for you, and then rolling with it? For instance:
GM: "You start in the local watchman hall. . Why are you here?"
Player: "The bailiff called for us?"
GM: "The bailiff enters from a side door and now you manage to finally get a good look of him? What stands out to you the most?"
Player: "That he has a wooden leg."
GM: "The bailiff limps to you and with a tired voice says: I want you rat-catchers to find the basilisk that took my leg."
Is this lazy? Does it give too much space for the players to break the campaign? I still haven't used it in my games but am really considering it.
"Serving weenie" made me laugh embarrassingly loudly in public. Good work, Matt.
My upcoming campaign starts in a tavern, The Twenty-First Pint, but its empty, the windows are nearly entirely boarded up. The doors are locked and barred, one single small uncovered slit of window can be seen through. A silhouetted shadow of a human from a twitching fireplace behind can be seen through the window.
The hook is that the town this tavern sits in has been attacked and is burning to ash, no campfires, by a group of hags who are capturing and sacrificing the villagers and constructing scarecrows to keep the few surviving villages in place so they can return to corrupt and capture the souls of those left.
An arch that prevents them from knowing where they are is that their king from their prior one shot has sent them to this village to investigate the special beer that this town makes. So they all got drunk and or were petrified by the scarecrows and have had slight amnesia.
I started my last campaign with a horse chase. Because magic has been outlawed in the setting, and my players, being defiant, all decided to play magic wielders, I started the game with a cinematic opening of the players on horse back, tearing round the corner of a busy city street, followed by the city guard. I decided that there didn't need to be an actual prison break, as I thought that it would remove the effect of starting with such an epic start.
Everytime a new video comes out and an idea is displayed incredibly, all I can think is how I want to use it in my game. Never thought I'd be excited of the possibilites of starting in a Tavern.
I'd never really had a problem starting in a Tavern, beyond just not finding it very interesting, but this video gave me tons of ideas on how to do it well. Many thanks!
I like starting in Taverns because it's a useful cliche, most people around the table have been to a pub and all the in characters in the world been to a tavern. Creating a though line from our world to the world I'm building, starting somewhere more familiar to both pc and characters.
I'm writing a campaign that's going to start with all the players teleported into the middle of a maze. Which itself is a magical weapon powered by the creatures wandering around in it. First things they come across are dead monsters and adventurers giving them a stock of potions, good armour and weapons. Inside out D&D, start in the dungeon and fight your way out : )
Souns like the awesome movie Cube.
Marcos Nogueira it's been a long time since I saw that film, but sort of. The maze itself is based on the Gorgon's maze from Destiny. When they find the machine at it's heart (I'm all about machines with living and magical components) and destroy it to escape, they find out the maze was powering a a barrier stopping an evil kingdom conquering and 'civilising' a huge swathe of wildlands and the creatures in it. I'm planning to make it harder and harder as the campaign progresses for them not to pick a side between the civilised but rapacious kingdom and the wildlands, which will never tax you, or try and conquer you, but might eat you in your sleep.
I like your idea...
Matthew Clements this sounds wonderful. Personally, if I were in this scenario (me, not a character of mine) I’d side with the wildlands instantly. People give me headaches.
My very first game of D&D (in the WoT world): I slapped a grid map of a town I found online infront of them and asked, "Who is where, and why?" The Barbarian (Aiel Spearman) was buying traveling supplies while the Female Theif (Sanchean Slave) stole his gold pouch. The Thief and her companion a Half Giant (Sanchean Ogier) Fighter then bought supplies for themselves before continuing into the Inn. There the Aiel tracked them and had a peaceful conversation as he reaquired his gold. SUDDENLY; The churchbell is being rung franticly and they can hear screaming from outside. They all rush out and see the square is being attacked by bandits. They quickly deal with them showing off they're talents. Later after some investigation, intimidation and interrogation they find out that a dark mysterious person gave them information of this town and even gave some incentive to attack.
The 1st time I was in a party that started in a tavern, I had 54 gold left, & ale was 1 silver a pint. This was also the LAST time my college group was allowed to start in a tavern.
Taverns are awesome and Sam Riegel is a natural born DM.
Funny story, I strated a campaign (on my channel) where I described the small town's landmarks and more or less said, you just arrived in this town, each for your own reasons, where would you like to be? And halfof them chose the tavern.
17:00 People were blaming Sam Riegel for starting in a tavern, then Matt Mercer starts Campaign 2 in a tavern.
There is nothing like a common adversity to quickly bind characters together, whether its a barroom brawl or rounded up with a bunch of other people (who just happen to be your party members) into the local jail because of the tyranny of the local sheriff.
Okay, so, recipe for a good tavern according to this video:
- Give opportunity to players to interact with each other, but don't rely on it, especially with new players
- Have characters actively interact with them in some way
- Seize opportunity to introduce the main bad guy, ideally in a falsely or non-threatening way (I had a knight ask them if they had any info on a slaver giant that was part of the story)
- Have a fight break out to demonstrate ideally the central tension of the setting (Some of my vampires are bad guys, some are not... Maybe I could play on that)
- Have the tavern be a microcosm of the setting, representing as many different people and sides as there is in the outside world, at least as many as reasonably possible I'd assume
Suggestions:
-Have a character accuse them of something (true or not)
-Ask what they want to order, give them a menu (the items on the menu can give interesting tidbits of info on your setting, e.g. barely edible, or fancy monster meat)
-Have the people in the tavern react to an exotic race (Half orc, half elf... Not necessarily in the party)
-Do not place a +5 Holy Avenger sunk into the floor for some reason
Cobra6x6 I mean, now I have to have a sleepy bar in a quiet town where the barkeep has a ruby eye and there is a plus five holy avenger sticking out of the floor because Matt told me not to. cant tell me how not to run my game.
You know, it's actually an hilariously good idea. "How did it get there??" *Mysterious ruby-eyed bartender shrugs*
One of my early Gamemaster experiences involved Rolemaster. It also involved 10 players because 6 directly joined and made up characters or asked me to make one up for them, and 4 others asked at the last minute if they could play. So, since I was an undergrad and we all had tons of time and a conference room we could use all night, I said "sure!". I'd chatted mechanics with the first 6, and while I was able to use some pregens for the last minute arrivals I wanted to give them a quick overview of the system and the setting. To give me time to get the new characters up to speed, I started everyone else in the tavern and told them to roleplay with each other. Most of them sat down somewhere with at least one other person and started talking. No one knew who or what anyone was. I get a note passed to me.. from a thief. He wants to steal something from the person opposite him. Ok. He succeeds. Then I get a note passed from the player sitting opposite him, also a thief, who wants to steal from the person opposite HIM (Thief #1). He gets an exploding roll (in Rolemaster there's no limit to the total die roll), and off the cuff I rule that Thief #2 steals back the item that Thief #1 stole. Accusations start flying, a brawl broke out.. Pretty sure we never got out of the tavern, and the size of the group after that was about 5 players when the casual players who wanted to see what the whole RPG experience was about decided it was all too intense...
I like using the "orcs attack!" approach when making intros, the campaign I am currently running started in a carnival with sever games that I could use to explain to the player's different kinds of skill checks and such. Then when they started to lose interest the main villain of my campaign (a green dragon) attacked, forcing the characters to act. They saved people and stole horses from the stables and ran.
A personal favorite minor touch of mine in taverns is pulque. Well, I use pulque. You can apply this to any local, non standard alcohol, but I got the idea from pulque. Make it traditional to the region. Most meals include a single drink of it in taverns. It's served in a very traditional way. (I stick with a serving gourd bowl). And instead of having the players ask for it, have the server, without prompt, ask them what glass size they'd like. Have the glasses already at tables. Range them from single shots to flagons. Or even larger. Let their choice of serving size for what amounts to wine-strength alcohol inform of their character.
Your defense of the tavern as the setting for a campaign kick-off session is valid. As long as you are in a tavern because it's a microcosm of your campaign world, and you have planned characters and events that are going to engage the PCs there, you're going to be fine. The tavern becomes problematic when the GM just drops the brand-new, undeveloped PCs there with nothing to play off of, and expects them to roleplay their first meeting *with each other* in a generic tavern. I've seen supposed "pro" dungeon masters, who purport to earn a living through their RUclips channels and Patreon, subject both players and audiences to long, painfully awkward introductory sessions where they expect the players to introduce their new PCs to one another by roleplaying an otherwise uneventful tavern scene. I think it's best that you set up the PCs' backstories so that everyone in the party already has some connection with at least one other character in the group, and the characters are all acquainted with one another, even if they are not close. This is how it's done in Dungeon World, and almost every shred of gamemastering guidance in the Dungeon World book can and should be applied to D&D. Those first few minutes in a campaign are when the players need guidance the MOST, but its at exactly that moment that so many novice GMs give them the very least to go on. If you start your campaign with all the PCs connected in some meaningful way, and they run through a few sessions of adventuring, you can always do a flashback of their first meeting, as sort of a prequel to the main campaign. This will go much better, because by then, all the players will know there characters better, and will be better prepared to handle a roleplaying encounter with less obvious direction from the DM.
Yeah my first campaign started in a tavern and it wasn't that interesting.
But my actuall campaign I thought more about it and all my party members started on a ship. When they were asleep "Treanor-The great Necromancer" (the didn't know who he was he appeared as an hooded person) started a figth on the ship after a short fight which I planed all dropped to nearly 1hp he blasted the ship and sunk it and all players went unconsciously and awoke the next morning on the beach expect for them all ship members died only them were alive.
And this start was so epic.
Thank you for you're series for new DMs as me it's so helpful like the advise to introduce the big bad guy at the start.
This came at a perfect time. We aren't starting a new campaign, but the group is starting a new leg of the journey and a new plot in a city they've come to and are planning to operate out of the popular tavern in the town.
If you want to start in a tavern, I often find immersion is difficult to keep up for the first few minutes. Don't be upset as a DM if not everyone is into it right away. Also, don't be afraid to have an NPC who seems a little too aware that he's a character in a game. Just have someone run in, "HELP! KOBOLDS HAVE KIDNAPPED MY PARENTS AND RUN OFF TO THE OLD MOATHOUSE TO THE NORTHEAST AND THERE WAS TWO OF THEM AND THEYRE ABOUT 3 DAYS TRAVEL AWAY AND I HAVE 5 GOLD FOR ANDY 3-4 ADVENTURERS WILLING TO HELP!" is a totally fine way to get things started.
Just discovered these videos.Matt, I have been playing off and on since 1983 (9 yrs old).Love these videos as they bring back great memories.Just restarted playing again with friends.Thanks for making these!John
Late to the party, here, but fun stuff about food service in the pre-modern western world:
1: The idea of personal orders of pre-plated food is an incredibly modern one. before the 20th century, food was ordered for the table, and served on a communal platter.
2: an eating establishment having a "menu" in any sense is likewise fairly new. A lavish establishment in the renaissance might have had several things to serve its guests (and might even go so far as to make things by request) most places served whatever they cooked that day, or whatever they had butchered in back. Before refrigeration, one only had so much time to cook things like meat. Any "optional" food would likely be preserved, and depending on the time of year and poverty level, the place might *only* serve preserved or pickled food, and cereals (dried fish, pickle, and millet stew, anyone?)
3: In the more northern side of Europe, virtually every town or tavern (and even homestead) made it's own beer and served it's own local spirit (in cultures with widespread distilling.) This meant that there wasn't much of a culture of distinction in such drinks, and in most places there wasn't any choosing of "what to drink". A tavern would have it's one beer, and *maybe* it's one whisky. In wealthier places or in wine growing regions, it might also stock something from the next-door vineyard, (or import it as a show of luxury) likely still by the barrel.
In another video, in your opening, you voice a Dragonborn ordering "Ale. Mutton. And a place to sleep." this might be exactly how such an order might go in a medieval tavern. Although the specific of "mutton" might even just be "Food".
In short, everyone once served "shut up and eat it" and little else.
Alternate starter setting that encompasses "the world'. A refugee camp.
I've used the tavern twice:
I used your first adventure from the beginning of the series but changed it to the Blacksmith's son.
The other time I gave the player the exposition (brief) why they were just outside of town and told them they were to go meet a contact by in the Tavern by the person who hired them.
So I've been watching these for a few months since I started DMing and I just happened to finish this one today, which was great, because tonight I started a West Marches Campaign with a one shot for some level 1 players who were just getting started and it started.... in a tavern. They were kind of "hitting that wall," but one of them pronounced that he was a former politician, to which the tavern owner, immediately jumped the bar and proclaimed that "Westend is a place to get AWAY from political machinations!" and demanded 100GP for the meal (which cost next to nothing and the PCs didn't have) or threatened to call the guard to have them thrown out of town. Well over walks an NPC who asks them to complete a task just out of town and indicates they will pay them 300 GP for doing so and smooth things over with the Tavern owner. Make the characters be reactive and provide an outlet. They immediately took up the task and left. The adventure received good marks.
Not to mention that the traditional setting of DND is medieval fantasy. The tavern/public house is usually the social center of these cultures. When most folks got off work they didn't go to the theater, sports hall, movie house, watch TV, read a book or news paper(literacy?), surf the internet, or any of the other social activities that we take for granted today. Everyone, at some point, ended up in the tavern for a meal, a night's sleep, news report, karaoke, etc. It's a great place to get things started and introduce players to each other and the other characters in the world. That's not to say that other social venues are not valid. How many Roman adventurers met at the coliseum? Maybe the church is the central hub of the local theocracy? Wouldn't wizards gather and meet at the library? A party of noble/upper class miscreants might go to the theater for a meeting.
My goblin adventure starts out with a HOT burn. They all come together and save the farmer's daughter (hopefully or it'll be a super short session), only to find out that when they get to the tavern, that the blacksmith's daughter has been kidnapped by other goblins... Mahaha!!! I'm thinking about stealing the dragonborn thing you do.
I love tavern starts. It's a great place where people of all kinds go, and while yes, adventures looking at the bounty board for adventure at the bar is trite and overdone, there's so many other things you can do with the bar. Just like your PCs go to taverns for information, so too do townsfolk. There's so much more to do there in terms of plot hooks than people think there is. People are so stuck with the typical "Tavern Start" that people don't branch out from inside the "tavern box" and instead just do something totally different. I love using something so adventure and d&d nostalgic, while still being SUPER creative. Best of both worlds.
My view is start wherever you want. Taverns are perfectly fine and don't be afraid to run your game how you want.
Most folks don't understand that once upon a time Tavern/Inn/pub was the ONLY place to meet for the carrying out of business in many places. Salons come in during the 1700s in France, but are an invite only place inside a home. Restaurants and Hotels are also VERY late (1750s).
In many places shops were little more than stalls that people came to on market day, usually Saturday, in rural townships. Very few standalone businesses, and those were very specialized (Mill, Blacksmith, etc.) most other tradesmen outside of a real city were travelers with wagons and carts or pack animals.
But in the City you could have other options... the Coffeehouses of London was were community life move to in Elizabethan times, for example. You didn't start fights there though, as a fight meant you might be excluded from the place and not be able to make business connections (the first stock market started out of a coffeehouse, as did Loyd's of London).
I don't look at my RUclips feed that often, but I guess I always check it around the time Matt posts because I'm always here haha
"The point of starting in a tavern is not to have your players entertain you by role playing at each other." Any other time though, I totally do that.
Our group started our very first D&D session a few months back. Even our DM was new to the game. We started in a tavern and it was great fun. Yes there was some awkwardness, but that gave it some tension. For me, as a player who already had worked out my backstory, I new a little bit of who my character was. We didn't really small talk in the tavern, we used it as a place to figure out what was going on in the town and all get thrown into an adventure together where we get to know one another along the way. And there was tension between the characters at first just because everyone doesn't always get along at first and we roll played that and it was awesome. It was also part of my wife's backstory to have fits of uncontrollable magical outbursts. Basically, she's the Phoenix off of X-Men. I loved it when she burned my friends dwarf's beard halfway off that first night. He shouldn't have cooked that rabbit that he caught! The tavern is what you make of it. It seems to be just as valid as any other way to start. I have really enjoyed your videos. Keep it up!
I started my campaign in 3 taverns simultaneously. all characters had reasons to be there before the game started. then I gave them reasons to all merge in one. it worked out fine because i'd given some players info that another needed, so they were roleplaying while I took care of the other location.
I love starting my campaigns in taverns.
With a nice demonic twist
To the ale. I make my party drink demons at the beginning of the game.
Comrade nothing more DnD than a drink that comes a fort AND a will save.
Sounds like an average day in _Kill Six Billion Demons_ .
I'm serious. In the webcomic _Kill Six Billion Demons_ , drinking liquor derived from blue devils is a common way to gain the ability to speak all languages. Of course a few hours later, the person then vomits up a baby blue devil, and has to eat it to retain the language mastery. Such is life, in -the Zone- the Spoke.
Bluecho4 that sounds both horrific and amazing.
Fine wine and spirits.
Heres an alternative take that I tend to favor. In the world my players often find themselves there is a sort of gentleman's agreement between all the races of that world called Stormtruce. Folks journeying across land caught in heavy storms seeking shelter often come across others. Due to the nature of this, Stormtruce basically means it doesn't matter who you are or where you come from. Rivalries, racial hatreds ect are set aside at least until the storm ends. Makes for a good dramatic opening to a campaign and gives a good, in universe reason why this disparate group of adventurers first met. So my 'first' session will often open as an adventure of exploring this cave or ruin which the party is seeking shelter in for the night. And typically concludes with them finding a nearby town and yes, going to a tavern usually for a decent meal and such.
I have started in taverns (or bars or cantinas etc.) in the past, but I typically work with players to concoct a particular reason they are going there (or staying there temporarily) and use those hooks to tie them all up together in advance. It requires quite a bit of planning, but it's a nice quiet place for shady dealings to happen in big cities and for players to get swept up in forces bigger than themselves as a result.
The 3 campagins I started:
1) Prisoners being moved towards a new prison. Being bossed around for 2 sessions by the most annoying NPCs ever. The story itself was very intresting but had very little player agency.
2+3) "you start in a tavern, but we will skip introduction, you all know eachother somehow", and no action or anything intresting happening in the tavern. :(
I've actually played in more campaigns that started in a prison than a tavern. Being prisoners gives the players something to bond over and a way to introduce the central tension, as the PC's all have some reason to be imprisoned. I don't start my own campaigns this way when I run a game, (I use a hot start, but I give a little background information first) but I know a lot of DM's do, so I actually find it refreshing when I start in a tavern because it's not another prison break opening.
I doubt any king would stay in a tavern even if passing through, they'd basically expect the town's mayor, or sheriff to put them up in his house, and the mayor can stay in the PUBLIC HOUSE until they leave. THAT feels more like what a king would do to me.
I'm starting a new campaign (this is my 3rd one), and I decided the best way to get the players together in a convincing way was to have them all independently take the job, and meeting up in a Tavern. "Never start in a tavern" be damned.
In the "You meet at the Gambolling Griffin" can be enhanced by doing some one-on-one RP with each player so that they better understand their character and how things work. By allowing the player to 'get into the skin' of the character they will be less unsure of themselves once introduced to the rest of the party.
I also encourage the players to have theior characters know each other. I joined an ongoing game back in 1990 and another player and I agreed that our characters were half brothers through our father. This meant that my brother could vouch for me to the other characters, thus making it less awkward.
In another game, which I was running, a new character was introduced tied to a tree. He had been robbed by the bandits the players were chasing and you might expect the players to cut him down and heartily accept this new compatriot, but the thief decided he was obviously a plant and killed him on the spot. The player of the thief was a bit of a jerk and was just doing jerk things so I allowed the other players to stop him.
I like starting at a town or city gate. Your PC's arrive at town all at the same time. Were they travelling together or just sharing the road? That's for them to decide. Show off the character of the town. Are they searched? Is this a super secured border with detention cells right there at the gate house? Or maybe a lone watchman waves them by from atop what might be called a tower, and that's that? In the former case, maybe a stranger that's been detained tries to appeal to the PC's for help, shifting suspicion onto them. In the later case, perhaps a shadowy figure slips past our not so vigilant lookout, and the PC's notice.
My all time favorite campaign I started the players in a Tavern... But then the Magistrate came in and pressed the characters into the service of the King Alleric the All Red. They were to scout out ahead of the main army. There were 2 companies of soldiers to help with enforcing this decision. The heroes made it to the top of hill when they heard quite a commotion from behind them and they watched the two companies of soldiers decimated by an Uurock (orkish) horde in a world where the Ork was considered extinct, ie: driven into the sea and those who were captured were executed almost 300 years earlier
This also assumes that the local Hobgoblins have yet to ban alcohol, as it is a manifestation of the forces of chaos.
I'm starting a campaign in a couple weeks, and I've been racking my brain trying to figure out a good way to start it. One of the first things I said was I'm not gonna start it in a tavern. Now, I know the perfect way to start it, and it will be in a tavern
I gave my game a twist on the trope by having each PC receive a letter informing them that they have inherited a tavern from a distant relative. Upon arrival at the tavern, they are dismayed to learn that not only are there other claimants, but the tavern is already owned and occupied. Worse, this sort of thing has happened before. So the barkeep isn't too fazed, the players have a chance to roleplay and/or brawl, and they are close enough to where the action will be. It went over quite well, especially considering we have a large group of 7-9 players.
Actually, the menu itself can be one potential source of adventures. If a particular tavern, for example, offers chuul, or giant spiders, or some other exotic item that has a strong tendency to fight back, right away the adventurers have a job they can do for cash, while immediately filling out some local color. And what *does* garlic-stuffed giant spider taste like anyway? And would you serve it with red or white wine?
Also, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Callahan%27s_Crosstime_Saloon is one of my favorite "You all meet in a bar" settings.
Thanks, Matt. Always fresh, always frosty.
One of the most informative and interesting videos about D&D yet. Thanks alot Matt!
I'm trying to think a dungeon I've been in that didn't start in a tavern... fuck!
I've been running my current campaign for a couple years now, and we started in a tavern at the edge of a magical desert. The PCs were attacked by keepers in the tavern (for those unaware, keepers are outsiders that collect and protect secrets), but the build-up to that was a lot of fun as I described these strange humanoids enter and very awkwardly spy on the party. When one of the party members made a Spot check and saw that they were doing weird things like drinking lamp oil (they know people drink but put little thought into what), it caused some really great roleplay before they finally got jumped and chased into the desert, where they saw a group of statues among ancient ruins that looked exactly like all of them. They're still trying to figure out what secret they know that the keepers were trying to silence. My secret: they haven't learned it yet.
If I had to spontaneously start an adventure, I would always start off in a tavern or venturing for the night into a town with a tavern. Once in a tavern, I could make up anything and make it fun and improv the rest. The tavern is my favorite place for setting up adventures.
This is literally one of your best videos.
Think this has been one of your most useful videos for me. As usual great content, thanks Matt
I feel like Taverns are great for new players who have never played before, but for more experienced players then its ok to move on to other starting locations. It's just such a classic way to start a campaign, I don't think we can truly get rid of it. As long as you're aware that some players have done it before, then mix it up a little like Matt said!
I certainly plan on having my friends start on an Airship when we start playing because I know they've done the Tavern point before already. Also a great way to introduce combat when you've got sky pirates. ;D